Give to God What is God’s – Matthew 22:15-22

Lectionary Readings for October 11, 2020            19th Sunday after Pentecost Year A
Exodus 32:1-14 The Israelites build and worship a Gold Calf
Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23    v1 Praise the Lord! Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever.
Philippians 4:1-9          v6 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.
Matthew 22:1-14          The Parable of the Wedding Banquet

But this week we’re focusing on Matthew 22:15-22 “The Question about Paying Taxes.”

Peace Quotes

“For though my faith is not yours and your faith is not mine, if we are each free to light our own flame, together we can banish some of the darkness of the world.” ~ Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks.
Worldwide, humanity needs to understand and embrace this wisdom. And in doing so, we must embrace the concept of accepting and working with people who believe differently than we do. Such embracing of others must be taught because rejecting others is all too frequently taught (often in the name of religions).

“I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me... All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.” ~ Jackie Robinson
Liking each other is not a condition for peace to exist. As Christians, God does not call us to be each other’s best friends. Rather, since we believe we are all God’s children, God calls us to love each other as God loves us. Respecting each other – regardless of our differences – as an expression of God’s love is an important step on our path toward peace.

Any time I preach or lead a group, regardless of age, I start the same way. I’m going to say three short sentences. Please repeat each sentence, with enthusiasm.
God made me.           God loves me.            God has plans for me.

Preface to Today’s Scripture Reading

In today’s verses, which occur during the last week of Jesus’ life – the local religious and political rulers overcame their usual differences to confront a common threat: Jesus. Today’s text is actually the first of three arguments Jesus has with the local religious leaders. We’ll read the second and third arguments over the next two Sundays.

Everything about Jesus’ ministry challenged the status quo of both the Jewish religious system as well as the Roman political system, and neither were happy about that at all. And before we align ourselves with Jesus too quickly, here’s a few modern words we might use to describe Jesus: agitator, rebel, revolutionary, anarchist.

But Jesus was not promoting anarchy. He was promoting a revolution in the sense that He kept describing a new society, a new way of living together that was mutually supportive and focused on love – a concept we often translate as the Kingdom of God. We also have a word for people who talk like that: hippie.

Keep in mind that, in Jesus’ cultural context, it was quite normal for adult men to pose challenging questions to each other as a way of determining who the wisest person. Questions were often answered with questions (a pattern Jesus often followed) until someone was finally backed into a conversational corner and either gave up or gave an answer. Notice that pattern in this story.

Let’s open our ears, minds, and hearts as we read today’s Scripture.

Read Matthew 22:15-22.

During my junior high and high school years, I cut grass to make money. In Georgia, this was a straightforward and reliable career since the grass grows year-round thanks to lots of rain. By the time I was 16, I’d built up a grass cutting empire in my neighborhood with 6 or 8 regular, weekly customers.

Rain was money from heaven because when it rained, the grass grew even faster which meant that some of my customers asked for an extra mowing. No problem at all. Cha-ching! And you just noticed that your gutters are clogged? Why yes, I offer that service upgrade. Cha-ching!

It was only after my first year of college that I got a “real job.” You know, something that required you show ID and fill out paperwork. Yeah, whatever. Until… I got my first paycheck and saw all the taxes that had been viciously stripped from me. Ridiculous!

That traumatic experience prompted conversations with some of my adult mentors. We discussed the value of social services such as… public paved roads, public libraries, public safety (fire and police), as well as the fact that I had graduated from a public high school and was attending a public state college that charged me FAR less than their actual cost of educating me.

Hmmm… well, I DO love a bargain. So the more classes I take, the better my educational bargain gets? Great, time to sign up for more classes and earn a minor in business! That made taxes a bit more palatable. Sadly, none of those public services were available in Jesus’ day.

In fact, the specific tax addressed in today’s reading referred to a tax that the local Jews had to pay the Romans. This tax, which was roughly equivalent to one day’s wage, funded the oppressive, abusive occupying military the Jews hated. In a nearly subsistence economy, a day’s wage was a big deal; paying the tax might mean your family didn’t eat that night.

Understand, the Jews were funding their own abusers. So you can better understand the very unusual and very temporary alliance between the Pharisees and the Herodians (the Jewish leaders and the political leaders, respectively). But they both wanted Jesus gone (dead would be fine) and taxation was the perfect question.

If Rabbi Jesus supports the tax, He aligns Himself with the oppressive Roman government and alienates the poor Jewish population.
If Rabbi Jesus opposes the tax, He would be labeled an enemy of the state and could be executed for treason.
He’s gotta stand up for His people, right?!?
There’s no winning answer, or so they thought.

But Jesus counters their question, first with a seemingly innocent, superficial question, “Who’s head and title is on the coin?” His challengers offer a quick and clear answer. Jesus then throws the curve ball answer that addresses a deeper understanding of the connection between the concepts of faith, ownership, daily living, and personal accountability.

Jesus’ brief comments would have caught the ears of the Pharisees and other Jews listening. His question about who’s face, who’s image, is on the coin would have made them think of the commandment in Exodus 20:4 “You must not make for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of anything in the heavens or on the earth or in the sea.” Devout Jews took that commandment very seriously. This alone basically accused the Pharisees of ignoring their own faith tradition so that they could enjoy participating in the local economy.

Jesus’ final words, “… give to God the things that are God’s” would have made listening Jews think of Psalm 24:1 “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it. The world and all its people belong to him.”

“Everything belongs to God; thus we owe everything to God. That means whatever we give to [our society] can and must be an expression of our deeper allegiance to God.” (Jarvis, Cynthia A., and Johnson, E. Elizabeth, eds. Feasting on the Gospels – Matthew, Volume 2. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013; 190.)

Mind you, Jesus is NOT promoting an extreme disconnection from society. He’s not offering a binary choice: church or state, pick one. Rather, Jesus is urging the people of his day, as well as us today, to use our God-given hearts and brains to decide, in light of our faith, what is the appropriate way for each of us to… to live.

This week’s Bible Study group shared quite the animated conversation about how we apply this to our lives. There were no easy answers. Many people in our congregation have built long careers in government jobs. Is that OK? We all pay our taxes even though none of us like every government our taxes fund. Is that OK? Again, binary yes-no answers are not the goal here.

The crucial question is how we integrate our faith into each day. For those of you still working – regardless of your employer – how can you integrate the values of your Christian faith into your workplace? Will you diligently try to follow the 10 Commandments and not lie at all? Or not steal at all – even when it’s only a few office supplies nobody will notice?

And regardless of where or even if you are working, how can you express the Fruit of the Spirit to the people around you. This is why I had so many of our “Fruit Cards” printed. If I could, I’d glue one onto every one of your steering wheels and bathroom mirrors. I’m not kidding! Making these attitudes a part of our daily lives and part of what we offer others IS the Kingdom of God here and now.

Voting
Which brings me to voting. Everyone’s vote matters, and every one of us votes every day. We vote with our time and our money. And as much as I believe in voting for political candidates and issues, I firmly believe that our daily votes of time and money are the most important votes we cast.

Every day we’re given 1,440 minutes to spend however we like. These minutes are freely given to us, they all expire at the end of each day, and they are all non-refundable. We vote to spend time engaging with or ignoring others and their needs. We vote to spend time complimenting or criticizing. We vote to spend time producing or destroying. We vote to spend time lifting up or tearing down. We vote to spend time working on our relationship with God, or not. And here’s the thing, we have to diversify our time investments. If we spend all of our time in just one way, our life will get out of balance. Even the most extreme extroverts need some alone time, and the most extreme introverts need to connect with others. We’ll all choose to spend our time differently than each other, and that’s OK; in fact, it’s great!

And then there’s money. We vote every time we spend money. When you buy one brand, you’re voting for it and against its competitors. When you buy fast food, you’re voting in favor of convenience as well as fat, salt, and sugar – the holy trinity of our taste buds. Am I meddling yet?

When you buy local, you are voting in favor of local owners and local suppliers. Are national chains bad? No, but however you spend your money, there is a local impact. Study after study shows that local businesses hire more people, pay higher wages, and return more money to the local economy especially in the form of donations to local causes. We experienced this every month with our HOPE Food Pantry. And when you make a generous donation to our church, you’re voting in favor of the many ministries our church supports.

I say all of this not to make you feel badly about anything, but rather as a message of hope and encouragement for the future. Look at how you’re voting with your time and money. You have these precious resources at your fingertips. Each day is an opportunity to put your faith into action as we all try to live into the Great Commandments of loving God, loving ourselves, and loving others.

This week, this month, this year… I encourage all of you to consider the issues and vote each day for a better you, a better family, a better community, and a better church. Led by our faith, we really can vote our way toward making the Kingdom of Heaven a reality around us.

Amen? Amen!